Hogan, Come Back
by codenamepapabear
Summary: Brief epilogue to Hogan, Go Home (3x19). Hogan/Newkirk slash.


"Colonel, I thought you'd gone _mad._"

Blue-gray eyes deep-set in an impish face bored into Hogan, catching the colonel in the crosshairs of Newkirk's gaze. The corporal was presently seated on a small and flimsy wood bench, fidgeting occasionally as he tried to share the space more effectively with Hogan. He drew his knees up to his chest and leaned against Hogan's shoulder, gaze transferring absently from the colonel to a dim lightbulb that hung from the ceiling.

"Why's that?" Hogan shifted lazily to accommodate Newkirk's weight against him, the dirt wall of the tunnel leaving slight crumbled residue on the back of his leather jacket. The past few days had been one of his most harrowing experiences yet, but here he sat as though he'd just returned from any ordinary mission. His attitude reflected nothing of his recent confrontations with the bumbling Crittendon and a prideful, bitter Klink who, having the upper hand for however briefly, had twisted the knife for as long as he could. But Crittendon was at a different Stalag now, no longer serving as a menace to the Unsung Heroes operation. London's orders were rescinded, and Klink was firmly pinned under the weight of his own incompetence once more.

"We all did!" Newkirk defended his position as respectfully as he could, resting back against Hogan's shoulder again. The colonel made a better pillow than the bench or the wall, and Hogan was raising no protest against the Englishman's presence beside him. Every prisoner had his own unmarked area of the tunnel system to retreat to after harrowing missions, and Newkirk had gotten into the habit of inviting Hogan to join him in his own. "And then, when they said they were going to put you on the bleedin' Berlin Express!-"

"Newkirk, you know I had my orders." Hogan chastised him lightly, reaching out to prod his shoulder, but something stayed his hand at the last moment and he ran his fingertips through the Englishman's dark, tousled hair instead. To be fair, he'd been just as terrified of the prospect of being on that train as Newkirk had been. Nevertheless, the Heroes had found a way to save him. He knew they would. "Why didn't you just chop down that tree?"

"I 'ad my orders." Newkirk fixed Hogan with a stern look as he returned the answer, but his face softened into a smile within a second, rendering his features even more pleasing than before. "From Crittendon, true, but someone's got to follow 'em." He wondered out loud, eyes half-closed as his weariness began to show. "How ever did that man get to be a Colonel?"

"Nepotism. It's got to be. How did _Klink_ get to be a colonel? Same answer." Crittendon's rank and authority over Hogan irked the American colonel more than it should. Never before had he met a man so convinced of his own superiority. No- there was one exception: Klink. Maybe Crittendon was Klink's allied counterpart. Hogan couldn't hide a smirk as an idea came to mind. "Those two ought to fight a war all on their own. They'd save the rest of us a lot of trouble."

"Now _there's_ a notion." Newkirk returned the smirk with a cheeky grin, reaching out and winding his fingers into one of the lapels of Hogan's jacket. He didn't pull him closer, just held him tight. "If we're bein' honest with each other, I was worried more about that train than you goin' home. Once we found out it was Crittendon, I figured you wouldn't leave us with 'im."

"You got _that_ right. It'd be the end of the operation." Hogan wasn't about to stand by and see his hard work ruined. Neither was he willing to leave his men under the command of an inept clod like Crittendon. "And who cares about bond-selling tours? Other than the Allied High Command, I mean." He pondered the problem a second longer. "But I've said it before, I'm not walking out that front gate for good until everyone's with me."

"Very noble of you, gov'nor." Newkirk smiled up at him again, holding him close. He'd slipped his arms around Hogan's waist by now, doing what he couldn't when they weren't alone. Though Hogan pushed the boundaries as far as he could with all those affectionate gestures and shoulder squeezes and waist touches that inevitably happened even when others were nearby. Hogan was fearless, and Newkirk admired that. "'Ow'd you slow down that Kraut wagon, anyway? The one you were in?"

A wry grin crossed Hogan's face. "Slashed the tires when they weren't looking."

"With what?" Newkirk's brow furrowed in curiosity.

"That swagger stick Crittendon gave me. It had a saber inside it."

Newkirk nodded, then muttered under his breath. "Should've run 'im through with it."

"I considered it." Hogan's face was perfectly serious, save for a faint twitching at the corner of his mouth. "Which reminds me..." He reached up, plucking his cap off his head, and handed it to Newkirk. "I need you to sew up a hole."

"He got your 'at, huh?" Newkirk turned the hat over his hands, taking note of the puncture in it, then set it aside, turning to stretch out his legs lengthwise on the bench. "It'll be no trouble at all, sir."

"Thanks." Hogan glanced up at the dim bulb suspended from the ceiling, then at his watch. Five minutes after one o'clock in the morning. "How'd you get a light in here, anyway? I thought Kinch didn't wire this part of the tunnel."

"He didn't." Cheerful pride lit up Newkirk's face. "But I'm a very fast learner."  
"I've noticed that." Hogan ruffled the Englishman's hair once again, brushing it up off his forehead. In response, Newkirk moved closer, resting his head in the juncture between Hogan's neck and shoulder, and came dangerously close to perching himself in the Colonel's lap. Hogan met this action with a firm hand on his shoulder. "And what do you think you're doing?"

"Gettin' comfortable." Newkirk hastily moved away, extricating himself from Hogan's grasp. Maybe he'd misjudged the situation. A few kisses now and then meant nothing in wartime. He sat on the bench, back pressed against the wall and his hands in his lap, an air of purposeful penitence about him. "Sorry, Colonel."

"Hey." Hogan reached out and grabbed hold of the collar of Newkirk's sweater, hauling him back towards him abruptly until they were separated by a mere few inches. "I didn't tell you to stop."

Newkirk did his best to straighten himself up, using his hand to brace himself against the flimsy wood of the bench. His heart was pounding in his throat and ears, anticipation clouding his senses. So he'd been right after all. The corporal muttered an obedient "Yes, sir," but Hogan silenced him with a kiss, lips pressing firmly against the Englishman's soft mouth.

Newkirk answered the kiss readily, unzipping Hogan's jacket and winding his arms around his waist to get closer. Hogan was warm and solid and lived up to his reputation for talented kissing, a discovery Newkirk had made after their first encounter. Now the corporal held him like both their lives depended on it, all the pent-up stress from unrealized possibilities emerging in the force of his embrace. Hogan could have been shipped back to the States and never seen again, he could have been caught during the escape and sent to a different Stalag, he could have been replaced by Crittendon and shut up in the cooler by that bastard Klink, and worst of all, he could have been on that explosive-laden Berlin Express, destined for a premature demise. None of that had happened, though. Hogan was safe in his arms. Newkirk pushed these ideas aside and succumbed to the kiss, tasting and enjoying and cherishing the experience. He let him take the lead, then followed Hogan's tongue, playing opposite him and responding to his movements until they were locked in the deepest of kisses.

The colonel had been first to initiate the affection, now he was the first to end it. He drew away from Newkirk with a reluctant breath, inhaling fresh air but enjoying it less than his lover's kiss. Newkirk tasted of smoke and coffee and something else unique, and Hogan savored it more than the bland kisses of so many interchangeable German fräuleins.

Newkirk was first to speak after the encounter, though, filling the silence with quiet speech as he resumed his position of resting beside Hogan. "Gov'nor?"

Hogan had shut his eyes, unable to keep a soft smile off his face. "Yes, Peter?"

"Nothin'." Newkirk squelched his earlier line of thought, more interested by Hogan's new and more familiar manner of addressing him. "It's Peter now?"

"No reason why it shouldn't be, as long as it's just us." Hogan was well past any reasonable boundary of professional behavior by now. Then again, Hogan's respect for arbitrary authority was nonexistent. This was war. Different rules applied here. "We'd better get up to the barracks soon. Someone might be looking for us."

Newkirk took hold of Hogan's wrist, checking his watch for him. "At one-fifteen in the mornin'?" He hauled himself to his feet, pulling away from the colonel reluctantly. "If you say so, sir."

Hogan reached out for him, catching hold of blue cloth. "I said 'soon', not 'now'. Come back."

"Oh, now it's _you_ who's wantin' _me_ to stay." A spark of amusement danced in Newkirk's eyes, but he readily resumed his former seat, a little closer to Hogan's lap than before. "I see how it is."

Hogan grumbled good-naturedly, irritated at himself for even having made the choice to leave. "Hey. I made that decision on the spur of the moment in the middle of the night. Don't hold it against me."

"You've got a point there, Colonel." Newkirk finally took the plunge and scooted over into the colonel's lap, resting in his arms with his head on Hogan's shoulder. He might not get this close ever again, and he saw no reason not to make the most of the opportunity. "But not every decision you make in the middle of the night is a bad one, sir."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that." That was Hogan's cue to lean over and press another soft kiss to Newkirk's lips, shutting him up for just a few seconds. At the kiss, Newkirk stretched out a hand on instinct and attempted to grab hold of Hogan again, but the colonel pulled away just out of reach, so Newkirk settled for resting his head on Hogan's shoulder instead. Delight permeated the Englishman's features, mouth curving upwards and crinkles forming at the corner of his eyes as he held back a grin. He enjoyed the quiet moments he spent with Hogan even more than the action-packed missions that had become the team's specialty.

The two men's feelings for each other commonly simmered between temperate fondness and uninhibited passion, with occasional dashes of contrite disaffection when they considered the consequences of being caught. Newkirk had quickly come to the realization that girls were a poor replacement for what he really wanted; meanwhile, Hogan still enjoyed female company, but he valued Newkirk above any other. There was no acceptable substitute.

Newkirk stretched out, flexing his limbs, and then curled up on the bench beside Hogan. "Gov'nor, you think Klink's going to cause any trouble?"

"I hope not." On the subject of Klink, Hogan itched to launch into an impromptu dissertation. He'd spent more time than he wanted to analyzing the Kommandant's actions, motivations, and behavior, and he genuinely put a lot of work into his job of being a Kraut-handler. It was rare that he had an opportunity to explain his methods. "Klink needs victories to sustain his complacency. Most of the time, what I do is construct those victories for him - lead him down the primrose path until he hits an idea. It's a very subtle form of mind control, actually." He grinned. "But as long as Klink thinks it's _his _idea, we're fine and he doesn't suspect a thing. We only have trouble when he starts thinking on his own. See, Klink's lazy and doesn't like to think up ideas for himself. He follows the path of least resistance, which usually corresponds to whatever I've come up with. But sometimes, when he get an opportunity to upstage me, like with Crittendon, he'll revert to thinking of me as a threat. That's where the problems come from." He looked distantly at the ceiling. "It doesn't happen often, though. Hey, we can't use any escape-attempt diversions for a while. He'll be on the lookout. Got it?"

He received no response from Newkirk.

"Hey." Hogan glanced down at the man resting against him, prodding his shoulder gently. "Newkirk?"

The corporal had shut his eyes and promptly drifted off to unconsciousness. He was now weakly clutching Hogan in his sleep, his soft breathing punctuating the stillness.

Hogan couldn't bear to wake him directly. Instead, he shifted his weight on the bench and did his best to lift Newkirk in his arms, but failed and sat back down again heavily.

The Englishman struggled against the hold, blinking blearily at Hogan. "Rob?" He cleared his throat abruptly. "I mean, Colonel?"

"You fell asleep. Let's get upstairs." Hogan kissed Newkirk's forehead, then took hold of his hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. "Got a flashlight? You go first."

Newkirk searched his pockets, dislodging numerous small items before finally locating a packet of matches. "No, but I've got this."

"Here." Hogan reached for his own flashlight, which he'd set near the door. After flipping the switch to turn it on, he tugged at the string that controlled the room's flickering and erratic lightbulb, plunging them into darkness save for the light that Hogan held. He passed the torch to Newkirk, then placed a hand on the corporal's shoulder. "Be careful."

"I will." Newkirk flashed him a grin, then leaned a little closer. "How 'bout a goodnight kiss?"

"How about you get upstairs?" Hogan feigned sternness for a moment before giving Newkirk what he'd requested, a sweet and lingering kiss guaranteed to make his dreams just that much more enjoyable.

"Goodnight, Peter."

"'Night, gov."


End file.
